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westwhere2022-06-03 07:06 pm
groundrules) wrote in westwhere2022-06-03 07:06 pm
Entry tags:
- 2ha: chu wanning,
- arcane: viktor,
- asoiaf: daenerys targaryen,
- game of thrones: jon snow,
- idolish7: tenn kujo,
- kingdom of the wicked: emilia,
- kingdom of the wicked: wrath,
- mo dao zu shi: xue yang,
- oh! my emperor: beitang moran,
- star trek: jim kirk (aos),
- storm at sea,
- test drive,
- tian guan ci fu: xie lian,
- travel arc,
- umbrella academy: diego,
- umbrella academy: five,
- vampire diaries: damon salvatore,
- warcraft: anduin wrynn,
- warcraft: wrathion
no man's sea
Avast ye — sprawling til 18 June is part I of the Storm at Sea travel arc, which doubles as a test drive. Participants don’t need an invite to reserve or apply over 10-17 June.
Try to label if you’re a test drive tourist or an old timer — and don’t hesitate to leave an OOC note to opt out of random NPC piraaaaaaaargh interaction. Test drivers can post both log and network prompts. Have fun!
AHOY! SCALLYWAGS
Departing Ke-Waihu, the existing party joins paranoid pirate king, turned stalwart saint Samuel Vane — the feared Quicksilver Sam — aboard the Pariah.
Test drivers awaken anguishing at sea, floating on rafts, or on minuscule patches of deserted land. They are collected by two pirates and the recalcitrant sorceress Karsa — who supplies translation and communication devices. She explains the newcomers were summoned into the land of Akhuras by warring undead factions. Karsa’s master, the elusive Merchant, ferries newcomers east to beacons hoped to return them home. He has secured them passage on the pirate vessel Queen Zanyra of ’Wet Rope’ Caladan Kreil, an associate of Quicksilver Sam.
The Pariah and Zanyra meet at sea, a day’s travel away from Ke-Waihu:
- ■ Characters overhear that Quicksilver Sam seeks to reach the haunted Crossing Seas and ‘settle an old score.’ Long-term ally Caladan Kreil supports his cause.
■ The two vessels make daily supply and crew exchanges by rowboat. The Pariah’s passengers must give the passcode: flaunted like gold to board the Queen Zanyra. Staff of the Queen Zanyra must speak the words before the blind man to access the Pariah. Forget your passcode and fall at the mercy of whoever patrols the decks!
■ Tasks await all passengers: diligently clean and polish decks, climb tall masts to sew torn sails, banish a preposterous number of seagulls, fish, read post or… dubious novels to sailors, count loot, guard the decks, clean cannons or serve as boat lure for shark fishing. Medics and cooks can practise their natural trades, while musicians and entertainers should amuse the crew.
■ By all means, grab thematic garments from crew coffers. Also available: daggers, swords and rare pistols.
■ Characters may notice both ship crews are spirited, but grow weary when Quicksilver Sam fitfully orders his five on-call priests to carry out protection rites, or to ‘exorcise’ evil from random staff — through ineffective bitter potions, shrill chants and requests to sit in unusual luck-incurring poses, or to commit some mundane, repetitive task. Let’s bore the devil away.
■ Treat senior crew with respect: some pirates are equally drunk on rum and fleetingly authority and reward perceived slights with a 24h-stay in the brig. These fine accommodations fit two and annul powers while there. No dinner.
■ Sleep where you can: hammocks and rotting mattresses can be found in great common halls beneath decks. The sick and women (naturally, ill omens at sea) can share the four private cabins of each ship. Sumeragi Subaru has his own cabin aboard the Pariah.
■ Each night, expect drinking beneath the halls and a pirate’s greatest hobby: gambling. Conmen might lure you into an ‘innocent game’ that sinks you deep into debt, winning your valuables, favours, or kidney!
■ Ladies are afforded a wide, begrudging berth and some authority over the crew.
■ Accommodations: fresh potions are readily available to ward off sea sickness, and magically resilient oranges are on hand to counter scurvy. As woe would have it, the long-serving Mr. Ishmael has passed, and his earthly remains have been retained aboard the Pariah for Kaneki Ken. Viktor receives a leashed emotional support albatross — a large, loud but docile bird that flies above him counter-current to balance him, whenever the ship’s sway threatens his footing.
OBJECTIVES
- ■ Discover why good Quicksilver Sam is intent on his haunted travels. The captain declines audiences, but try to get information from the two crews.
■ Please share the information gained via network…!
THAT SON OF A BISCUIT EATER
Trouble starts to brew, within days at sea:
- ■ Be on the lookout while on watch duty: on a handful of occasions, new faces appear aboard. They fail to offer the passcode — and attempt to injure characters, throw them overboard, or to enter the captains’ lodgings. Sound the alarm or seize intruders!
■ After interrogating an infiltrator, Caladan Kreil sends word that the assailants hail from the Concord, a war vessel of the Dawns’ Reach Trade Company that is pursuing the pirate ships at distance under the command of Maximilian Hawk. A credit to his name, Wet Rope Caladan has the spy hanged.
■ Prepare to get drafted for double watch duty, as both Caladan Kreil and Quicksilver Sam bolster defences. Tensions escalate, with pirate crew questioning the loyalties of newer recruits.
■ A few days later, at dawns, the silent, swift and massive Concord approaches close enough to fire its cannons at both ships and send vicious militia to climb aboard. Defend your ship!
■ The Concord withdraws by midday, after lightly damaging its opponents. Help with repairs and enjoy some rum — you’ve survived your first sea scuffle!
MOLLYWICK
Just short of entering the Crossing, where the seas are dark and highly opaque, the Queen Zanyra and Pariah encounter a stretch of vibrant, lushly forested land.
- ■ Both vessels send crew over for a few hours, with captains urging quick incursions. Pair up to collect berries, scant mushrooms and sweet water. Curiously, no animals are found.
■ Veteran sailors say this is the Neverflight isle of myth, where sea kings have buried their treasures. Pirates share legendary coordinates of long lost loot, archived as riddles or poems. Grab a shovel and a-digging you go!
■ …ah, but don’t linger too long. What pranksters your sailor friends are. Within hours of the island’s appearance, the earth beneath your feet crumbles and quakes, and the land starts to sink. Evacuate or call for help to get out of here — as the great white whale Mollywick submerges in the waters with the Neverflight island it carries on its back. Hopefully, you don’t go under with them.
■ If you’ve threaded out a treasure dig, drop a line to receive some especially deplorable loot. You deserve it.
THE CROSSING
The Pariah and Queen Zanyra — frequently chained together to avoid separation — creep into the Crossing : a stretch of eerily silent waters, dark and volatile.
■
- ■ Slowly, a thick, nearly impregnable fog dawns during the day, covering the sun and leaving the skies a desolate slate. Dreadful storms spark at night.
■ Strange, talking carps jump on board, offering to tell you your future. Caution: they only make bad luck readings (request yours) that turn true. They appear wherever their target flees and are exceptionally annoying, until either the moon rises, or you apply the superstitious cure of throwing salt on them.
■ Nightmares haunt you — your own, or glimpsed memories of ships crashing, sinking, falling to storm. Note: only your character suffers these memories/nightmares, but everyone else can experience their exhausted grumpiness, come morning.
■ Be wary, when pairing to cross over to the other pirate ship: you may find another rowboat beside yours, its sailor begging for an oar or ladle. If you give him one, he shovels water into your boat with inhuman speed — desert your vessel and swim quickly to a pirate ship, before undead hands pull you into the sea.
■ While alone on deck, characters might hear sweet, coaxing voices that urge them to walk the plank into the water. Break your brethren from this spell, or watch them fall into the arms of man-eating mermaids.
■ Now and then, the ships are shaken by long, whips of something lashing from the depths.
■ Pirates become increasingly skittish and on edge. Priests perform countless protection rites and exorcisms on both ships.
■ At night, a handful of undead men climb aboard. They lack awareness and are in a clear state of discomposure, looking to catch the living and drown them. With toothless, rotting mouths, some rasp, This is kinder.
■ As you officially enter the Crossing, beams of light erupt in the horizon, showing the distant silhouettes of several ghost ships.
NOTES
Tonia | In Sound Mind | Tourist
Being a cat, there aren't too many tasks that Tonia is built to do. Nor does she feel she necessarily needs to, given her superior ability to evade whoever might want to make her work. (You don't see humans so easily slipping behind barrels, do you?) But she's not opposed to being helpful, and given the confusing and threatening circumstances she's found herself in, she'd rather comply than risk being rounded up and used as shark bait.
As such, you might catch a flash of white fur as she chases yet another seagull from a perch on the deck. "Go on, shoo!" She calls after it as it flies off, probably to just find another place to land about a minute from now. Or another one will. They seem to be endless.
She sighs, taking a brief moment to rest, only for a fine spray of salt water to mist over her. Making a face, she shudders in a vague attempt at fluffing her newly dampened fur. The ship is sturdy, and this is nothing compared to the flimsy raft she'd started out on, but still-
"Ugh, why does this place have to be so wet?"
Crossing
Wherever they are now, she doesn't like it. The sea is calmer, but it's not peaceful so much as creepy, and she'd happily trade the thick fog for the occasional sprays of sea water. Not to mention the fish. That felt like a particular form of personal torture, considering fish were supposed to be both silent and tasty. These were definitely neither.
She makes a slight scoffing sound when she spots someone struggling to avoid one of the irritating talking carp. "Don't bother. The only way I've found to get rid of them is to eat them, and that doesn't even last for long." As if on cue, one flings itself onto the deck next to her and asks her yet again if she wants her fortune told. Her long-suffering gaze flicks to the fish and then back at the person she's talking to as if to say, "You see?"
Her features twist in mild disgust. "They really don't taste good, either."
Scallywags
She looks around her for the source of the voice, her eyes landing only on the cat, who looks so indignant Rey could almost believe she had spoken. It gets a laugh of her in spite of herself, and she looks around again for the actual speaker in confusion for a few moments before turning back to the cat, nonplussed.
"He..llo?"
She glances around her furtively, hoping no one's witnessing this. It can't have been the cat. Right?
no subject
"I'm guessing this is the first time a cat has spoken to you."
no subject
Rey looks genuinely concerned, like this might be a sign of either madness or a new Force ability she has absolutely no idea how to control. Is she reading the cat's mind somehow? Is the cat telepathic? Could there even be Force-sensitive cats?
All things she would've asked Luke Skywalker if she hadn't ended up here.
Unfortunately for them both, she's stuck asking a cat.
"Can you talk to everyone?"
no subject
"It seems like it, so far." She hasn't tried to talk to very many people yet, so she can't say for certain. But the few she has have seemed like they could all understand. Where she came from, it had just been Desmond... but then, there weren't really any other people around there for her to try to talk to.
no subject
Maybe this is just a thing that happens! She doesn't know! She'd never heard of anything like that happening, but she'd also never heard of being able to fall out of one's own galaxy into an entirely different body of water to the one that one started in. It had been a weird week even before she got here, to be honest. This isn't actually much stranger.
no subject
She pads a few steps closer, sitting neatly and peering up at the woman. "I'm Tonia. What's your name?" They can start with introductions before they get into sorting out the details of the second and now third of the nine lives she apparently has.
no subject
Rey crouches down to cat-level and offers the cat a hand to sniff. She's not sure how close to loth-cats these kind are, but she doesn't want to get that hand bitten off if she tries to scratch this one behind her velvety-looking ears, no matter how great the temptation.
"I wonder if you're Force-sensitive? Surely some animals are, and if you're doing this telepathically it wouldn't matter that I don't speak cat."
Crossing
Even he draws the line at eating something that talks. No matter how obnoxious it is.
Unlike the perso- cat? Cat. Next to him. “I’ll keep that in mind,” he says gravely.
no subject
She settles into a more relaxed sitting position, intent on just ignoring the carp by her side for now. "So are you new here, too?"
scallywags
Caladan Kreil's no man to begrudge his passenger, not when she or he has paid the travel fairly. Quicksilver named that agreement done. And yet... he is less enthusiastic about some of the day's companions.
The cat, decisively, is a welcome exception. Even wet, she is pleasing in the way that a naturally tense animal evokes calmness from those around it. Reptilian, Caladan approaches, slipping to one knee to pass his hand each way on the cat's flanks and gently rub out some of the dampness. )
Roses are red. Violets are blue. Sister Sea does not love you.
no subject
Cryptic. Do you always speak in rhyme?
no subject
( He murmurs, and takes his time with the expulsion of the last ounce of water that friction can tease free of fur, palms willing. She is a nimble thing, a fitting size for a mouser or a spy or a child's plaything. He cannot say. )
If she were, she would be forgetting she is my guest. ( Remember, madam, and he does not turn the edge of his sharp teeth on her — this be your captain. ) And that would do her a great disservice.
( And the threat there, inevitable: that a cat who walks the plank might land on her feet in water — and still drown thereafter. )
no subject
I'm not cross. [In fact, she's grateful for the help getting the water out of her fur, even leaning into the captain's hand to add friction to that last pass. She stretches out once he's finished, pleased with how much less wet she feels, though it'll still take time to go away entirely--if it ever does while she's on a ship.]
Thanks for helping me dry off. [She means it.]
no subject
( Said, this time, with a measure of slithered amicability, as if it is only the most natural thing in this world and the next to parade one's hands on the body of a helpless fresh-faced recruit.
When he raises himself to both feet, he offers his fair feline friend a wave, as if to gently steer her in the appropriate direction for their deck stroll. Better to walk in the company of a ship's captain than to subject oneself to the mercy of the crew, surely that. )
The seas are not known for their hospitality, but we make every attempt.
( With cannons and daggers and sailors muttering about the dwindling quality of the latest shipments of saltpeter, apparently. )
scallywags HI
He's frustrated, having left behind his galaxy, his mission, his post and not of his own volition, while he hastily wipes down the canons as instructed. All the while muttering his fair share of curses, wiping the water out of his hair with a gloved hand.
"That's what happens on a boat. You get wet." He looks around for the source of the voice and finding none, sits down to give the sodden cat a scratch behind the ears.